{"id":127988,"date":"2019-02-15T23:29:00","date_gmt":"2019-02-15T23:29:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/sftarticles.wpenginepowered.com\/en\/?p=127988"},"modified":"2025-07-01T22:21:33","modified_gmt":"2025-07-02T05:21:33","slug":"ai-news-media-future","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/ai-news-media-future\/","title":{"rendered":"AI and the media \u2014 what’s next for news of the future"},"content":{"rendered":"

News organizations have lost the power to define what is and isn\u2019t news. Instead, social media channels and aggregators have called the shots<\/a>, capitalizing on algorithms that directly impact the content that users see, as well as the type of content that gets created.<\/p>\n

Marketing and advertising have been capitalizing on AI innovations for years, to the detriment of reliable news.<\/p>\n

By contrast, few media outlets have harnessed the burgeoning technology successfully. Yet, AI offers a ton of promise for the media industry.<\/p>\n

What stands in the way of AI adoption on a mass scale? Here\u2019s a look at some of the challenges and emerging trends within the space.<\/p>\n

Where are we at with AI and the news?<\/h2>\n

\"ai<\/p>\n

China rolled out their artificial intelligence news anchor <\/a><\/span>a few months back. The Washington Post has been using their robot reporter<\/a> for a couple years at this point. Other news organizations are using AI to help journalists analyze datasets that inform their reporting.<\/p>\n

Then there\u2019s the question of whether AI can write articles. The answer is, they can. However,\u00a0<\/span>writing is best done by a human<\/strong>, as it requires art, creativity, and empathy. Otherwise, you get something like this.<\/p>\n

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I forced a bot to watch over 1,000 hours of Hallmark Christmas movies and then asked it to write a Hallmark Christmas movie of its own. Here is the first page. pic.twitter.com\/HMEtkzHVCi<\/a><\/p>\n

\u2014 Keaton Patti (@KeatonPatti) December 12, 2018<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The best application is using robots as a resource for finding plagiarized content and errors and analyzing statistics<\/strong>. Or, perhaps, running a\u00a0media bias fact check.<\/p>\n

These elements come together for more accurate reporting \u2014 and let writers cover more ground in less time.<\/p>\n

We\u2019ve found that there actually are a lot of places where the media is taking advantage of the new technology. The problem is, like the artificial intelligence news anchor and the reporter bot, the news media has been using AI in these novelty applications.<\/p>\n

Unfortunately, they haven\u2019t been able to use it in the same ways that advertisers have — and are struggling to monetize.<\/p>\n

Why is that?<\/h3>\n

One thing slowing down mass AI adoption \u2014 at least on the distribution side is the business model. TV news is funded by advertising shown during commercial breaks.<\/p>\n

Companies that use AI for advertising or content distribution make money by selling products or through ad revenue. So, content that\u2019s interesting gets top billing over balanced, unbiased reporting on unsexy topics like local news coverage or regulatory issues.<\/p>\n

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After destroying local news, Facebook throws $300 million at local news<\/p>\r\n Read Now \u25ba<\/a>\r\n <\/div>\r\n <\/div>\r\n <\/a>\r\n <\/div>\r\n<\/div>\n

Some online news organizations now make money through digital subscriptions. Which, of course, is an alternative to the aggregator model which depends on behavioral targeting, clickbait, and promoting video content over the written word (customers see more ads, so more money).<\/p>\n

News by virtual assistant<\/h3>\n

Smart speakers like Alexa, Google Home, and Cortana are giving people an easy way to get their daily updates from news organizations.<\/p>\n

As such, several media outlets are beginning to experiment with how these digital assistants can help them deliver the news more effectively. According to Trushar Barot, of Harvard\u2019s Nieman Lab, newsrooms predict that AI-driven interfaces could have a greater impact on how we consume information <\/span><\/a>than the iPhone.<\/p>\n

That same article then mentions that these organizations say, \u201cthey\u2019re not technology companies.\u201d Yet, automatically generated voice content is the next great threat to journalism.<\/strong><\/p>\n

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How to personalize your Apple News feed<\/p>\r\n Read Now \u25ba<\/a>\r\n <\/div>\r\n <\/div>\r\n <\/a>\r\n <\/div>\r\n<\/div>\n

That said, not every news organization is sitting around ignoring innovation. NPR has been working on voice AI. NPR product manager Ha-Hoa Hamano says the broadcaster\u2019s hourly newscast<\/span><\/a> is a gateway to the rest of NPR’s content, allowing them to reach the 32% of 18-34 year-olds who don\u2019t have a radio<\/span><\/a>.<\/p>\n

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10 Tricks for spotting fake news<\/p>\r\n Read Now \u25ba<\/a>\r\n <\/div>\r\n <\/div>\r\n <\/a>\r\n <\/div>\r\n<\/div>\n

Lack of industry standards for AI practices<\/h3>\n

The media have been reporting on AI since day one. Yet, using the black box algorithms responsible for promoting fake news hasn\u2019t been part of the strategy. Responsible journalists can comment on these changes and continue to publish articles \u2014 and they should. But, it\u2019s going to be hard to enact change if things keep going as is.<\/p>\n

While newsrooms understand content and the process of creating quality content in a short amount of time, the next step is joining forces with sophisticated tech teams to reach a larger audience.<\/p>\n

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More about artificial intelligence<\/p>\r\n

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How AI will change the gaming industry \u25ba<\/p>\r\n <\/div>\r\n <\/div>\r\n <\/a>\r\n \r\n

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What are the biggest threats associated with AI? \u25ba<\/p>\r\n <\/div>\r\n <\/div>\r\n <\/a>\r\n <\/div>\r\n

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China unveils virtual AI news anchor \u25ba<\/p>\r\n <\/div>\r\n <\/div>\r\n <\/a>\r\n \r\n

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5 best AI apps you can download right now \u25ba<\/p>\r\n <\/div>\r\n <\/div>\r\n <\/a>\r\n <\/div>\r\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Will AI help the news or destroy it?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":9161,"featured_media":128727,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","wpcf-pageviews":0},"categories":[1015],"tags":[1401,1616,1775,1562],"usertag":[],"vertical":[],"content-category":[],"class_list":["post-127988","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","tag-ai","tag-artificial-intelligence","tag-journalism","tag-news"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/127988","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/9161"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=127988"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/127988\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":326570,"href":"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/127988\/revisions\/326570"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/128727"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=127988"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=127988"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=127988"},{"taxonomy":"usertag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/usertag?post=127988"},{"taxonomy":"vertical","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/vertical?post=127988"},{"taxonomy":"content-category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/content-category?post=127988"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}